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Despite the Republicans enjoying a majority in all
three branches of the federal government, the liberals
seem to have a lock on debates about public policy
because they are more skillful (or dishonest) in the use of
words. The current controversy about tax cuts is a good
example.

That master wordsmith Bill Clinton popularized the
use of the word "investments" as a synonym for taxes.
The IRS tax collector, using the police power of the
government, takes a big slice of your income while
sweet-talking you with the lie that this organized theft is
really an investment (even though it will rapidly vanish
rather than grow).

Some of it goes for useful purposes such as protecting us from foot-and-mouth disease. But lots more of it
goes for extravagant purposes such as a $514,148-a-year
luxury pad for Hillary Clinton in Manhattan.

The most offensive manipulation of words is the way
the liberals bleat that they can't "afford" a tax cut because it would "cost" too much. The liberals' mindset is
that a tax cut is something like a government grant or
subsidy to be awarded at the discretion of our royal
masters to persons of their choice.

The liberal worldview was aptly expressed by
President Clinton after his 1999 State of the Union
Address when he shuffled off to Buffalo and told his
audience that government must keep control of the tax
surpluses because the people won't "spend it right."

President Bush set forth the Republican response in
his first address to a joint session of Congress on February 27. "The choice is to let the American people spend
their own money to meet their own needs." Continuing,
he explained: "The growing surplus exists because taxes
are too high, and government is charging more than it
needs. The people of America have been overcharged
and, on their behalf, I'm here asking for a refund."

The federal government's current take in taxes is the
highest since World War II. It's the highest in percentage
of family income and the highest in percentage of U.S.
Gross Domestic Product.

The World War II generation accepted a crushing tax
burden (and the gimmick of payroll deduction that made
it possible) in the belief that the cause was worthy. In
any event, the sacrifice of their money paled in comparison to the sacrifice of their sons on the battlefield.

War is the biggest cause of Big Government, and the
politicians who tasted the prerogatives of distributing
appropriated monies continued to keep their hands in our
pockets long past the Korean War. Then another master
politician, President Lyndon B. Johnson, discovered that
he could coopt a massive pot of taxpayers' money by
drastically reducing the defense budget and then (in an
elegant metaphor coined by Newsweek) slicing up the
melon in domestic handouts that rapidly grew into
targeted entitlements.

When we hear wives and mothers assert that today's
economy "requires two incomes," that they "have to take
a paid job in order to maintain a reasonable standard of
living," let's be blunt about the cause of their financial
bind. Mothers don't "have to work" in order to support
their families; they "have to work" in order to pay their
taxes and support the federal bureaucracy.

In 1992, candidate Bill Clinton defined "the rich" as
those "over $200,000," but he was referring to lifetime
savings not annual income. The Democrats' tax plan
sponsored by then-Majority Leader Richard Gephardt
(H.R. 4848) and then-Senate Majority Leader George
Mitchell (S. 2571) would have reduced from $85%,000 to
$200,000 the property exempt from the death tax.

That would have enabled the tax collector to confiscate 32% to 55% of everything every American owned at
death (cash, investments, home, farm and small business)
in excess of $200,000. Fortunately, that bill never
passed, but it remains a classic example of the tax greed
of the liberals. (Phyllis Schlafly Report, Oct. 1992)

The first President Bush gave us a huge tax increase
in 1990, raising the top tax rate from 28% to 31% and
also taking away the value of benefits such as the personal exemption and itemized deductions. Three years
later in 1993, President Clinton raised the top tax rate to
39.6 percent.

The dirty little secret of our high federal income
taxes is that at least a third of the American people don't
pay any federal income taxes at all. If we are really going
to cut taxes, we will have to cut taxes for the people who
are paying taxes.

One way to cut taxes would be to reduce all the rates
that were increased under Bush I and Clinton. Another
way would be to make the employee's share of Social
Security taxes tax-deductible to employees, just as the
employer's share is currently tax-deductible to employers. Another way would be to make health insurance tax-deductible to individuals, just as employer's health
insurance premium payments are tax-deductible to
corporations.

The American people are caught in a tax trap; the
harder they work, the more they're forced to forfeit in
taxes. Congress should refund the surplus from the U.S.
Treasury; it's our money.

Two Faces of Marriage Tax Reform
Repeal of the marriage tax penalty was always good
for a big round of applause in the campaign speeches of
most political candidates last year. But the political
bombast usually concealed the social policy that lurks
behind the two approaches to reform.

The marriage tax is not verbally expressed as policy
in any statute but is buried in the numbers. You can't
find a section in the tax law that is labeled "marriage
tax." It is a consequence of the fact that our income tax
tables treat a married couple as only 1.67 persons instead
of two whole persons.

Remedying the marriage tax is not just a matter of
dollars. Ideology is at stake. Is the purpose of cutting the
marriage tax to give long overdue respect to marriage as
an institution fundamental to our society and to the
raising of children? Or is the purpose to enable government to engage in national economic planning by using
tax policy to influence human behavior?

If the purpose is the former, then it follows that all
married couples with the same income should be taxed
equally. Last year's Congress dealt fairly with this issue
by passing a bill that taxed one-earner and two-earner
married couples equally. President Clinton vetoed the
bill, and it did not become law.

If, on the other hand, the plan is to give a tax break
only to two-earner couples, that would replace the
marriage penalty with a new homemaker penalty. Even
politicians who don't particularly care about promoting
marriage should be squeamish about discriminating
against one type of married couple in favor of another.

But some influential policymakers argue that it
would be an economic good for the tax law to advantage
two-earner couples and disadvantage breadwinner-homemaker style couples. These economists praise
giving more tax breaks to two-earner couples because
that will induce married women toward greater participation in the labor force, which in turn will increase our
Gross Domestic Product.

Edward McCaffery, a law professor at the University
of Southern California, is favorably quoted in a Heritage
Foundation analysis of the marriage penalty (CDA00-02, 2-8-00) as stating: "The fact that potential workers would
avoid the labor force as a result of peculiarities in the tax
code is a clear sign of a failure to maximize eligible
resources. As a result, the nation as a whole fails to reach
its economic potential, which is demonstrated by decreased earnings, output, and international competitiveness." In other words, The Economy wants wives and
mothers to join the workforce in order to reach our
economic potential.

Alan Reynolds of the Hudson Institute wrote in
National Review in 1999 that the U.S. economy is
"running short of willing and able workers" primarily
because high marginal tax rates are "driving skilled
married women out of the labor force." The assumption
behind this argument is that fulltime homemakers are
economic non-contributors; they raise children as volunteers, indifferent to the wants of The Economy.

Look at how the two approaches to marriage tax
reform impact on a family budget. Let's say a married
couple is struggling financially and needs more income to
support the family, perhaps because of the birth of a
child. What choices are available?

One family decides to be a two-earner couple; the
wife takes a job and puts her children in daycare. Under
one plan considered by Congress, this couple would get
a marriage tax deduction of 10% of her salary up to
$30,000; that would chop as much as $990 off the family's federal income tax bill (at the proposed 33% tax
rate). In addition, this couple would qualify for the
existing tax credit for child-care expenses, which is worth
up to $960.

In another family, the husband moonlights at a
second job so his wife can care for their children at home.
This family will not qualify for either the 10% marriage
tax deduction or the child-care credit that exists in
current tax law.

Moonlighting at a second job is just one of several
ways a husband can provide his children with the benefits
of a fulltime mother and avoid commercial daycare. The
husband can work longer hours at his first job; he can
make the extra effort required to get a higher paying job;
he can go to school at night to train for a higher paying
career.

The husband and wife surely work just as hard in this
second family as in the first. Why should they pay up to
$1,950 more in federal income taxes on the same family
income? Who are the bureaucrats and politicians who
presume to use the tax power to force traditional
husband-breadwinner, wife-homemaker couples to
subsidize two-earner couples who hire paid child care?

The marriage penalty in the tax code is an immoral
policy, but it should not be remedied by giving a tax cut
only to two-earner couples. That would send the radical
feminist message that the government sees no value in a
homemaker's work at home, that the role of a "non-working" wife and mother is less socially beneficial (or
less worthy) than paid employment.

Fortunately, the House of Representatives made the
right decision on March 29 and passed tax reform that
treats all married couples equally (although the amount
of the tax cut is not nearly as much as we hoped for).

Look Out for Death Tax Deception
Bill H. Gates Sr., George Soros and Warren Buffett
say they are worried that repealing the death tax might
discourage wealthy people from giving money to charitable foundations. We are not impressed with their worries. In fact, their foundations are mostly private slush
funds that the super rich use to promote liberal causes
and enhance their own political influence.

Bill Gates, for example, put $25 billion into his
private foundation which his father runs. When Bill
Gates dies, the $25 billion will be exempt from the estate
tax even though his family can retain control of that
immense pile of cash far into future generations.

This same estate plan has been profitably used by
many of the super rich including Buffett, Soros, the
Rockefellers, the Fords, David Packard, and others.
Extraordinary amounts of money have escaped death
taxes through their foundations that are notorious for
promoting leftwing causes.

Bill Clinton is also working the foundation racket.
His Little Rock library (which doesn't have any books
but will have extravagant living quarters plus a designer
wardrobe for Hillary's use) raises tax-deductible money
from Marc, Denise and other super Rich in order to
enable Bill and Hillary to continue to live and travel in
the royal style to which they have become accustomed at
taxpayers' expense.

While "only" two percent of estates now pay the
estate tax, that's twice as many as when the first George
Bush was President. The number of taxable estates will
double again in the next few years, thus wiping out the
life savings of the hardest-working American families.

About 85% of federal estate tax returns filed are for
estates of $2.5 million or less. These Americans aren't
rich enough to escape the death tax through private
foundations, so they usually have to sell their small
business or farm to pay the death tax (at rates up to 55%).

Congress assured us it solved the problem of small
businesses and farms in the Tax Reform Act of 1997, but
that "reform" turned out to be "all hat and no cattle." It
is so complex that only about 3% of estates qualify, and
even those are in danger of the government re-visiting the
case and collecting the original tax plus interest.

The best way for Congress to deal with the death tax
would be to raise the exemption to $10 million right now.
This would be really meaningful to the very people who
deserve a tax cut, the people who have labored hard over
a lifetime to build up a family business, family farm, or
other family property.

Unfortunately, the bill approved by the House Ways
and Means Committee on March 29 would merely cut the
55% rate in small increments over the next 10 years,
giving little or no benefit to tens of thousands of Americans who die during the George W. Bush Administration.
On Jan. 1, 2011 the current death tax would be replaced
with a brand new tax called "carryover basis" on the heirs
who inherit the property from the deceased.

Ever since the 16th Amendment gave Congress the
power to tax incomes in 1913, no federal tax has ever
been levied on the heirs who receive property from the
deceased. The heirs have always received a fresh start
(sometimes called "stepped-up basis") in the appreciated
property their parents left them. If a new tax on the
children who inherit their parents' property is substituted,
Members of Congress should not get by with pious
platitudes claiming that they repealed the death tax.

Once before, during the Jimmy Carter regime,
Congress surreptitiously wrote carryover basis into the
law. When the public found out how complicated and
burdensome it was, they kicked up such an uproar that it
was delayed and delayed and then repealed in 1980.

Congress should be honest with the American
people: just raise the death tax exemption to $10 million
immediately and don't doubledeal us by imposing a new
post-death tax.

Big Brother in Our Washing Machines
Few changes in our society have done as much to
liberate women from the drudgery of "women's work" as
the washing machine. American ingenuity and the
private enterprise system combined to provide us with a
wide variety of models of this convenient labor-saving
appliance, the envy of women all over the world. Some
81 million households are equipped with washing
machines and 10 million are bought every year.

One of Bill Clinton's last acts as President was to
finalize new energy regulations designed to phase out the
washing machine models that most Americans have been
buying and to induce us to switch to more expensive
models. The same Administration that sanctimoniously
espoused "a woman's right to choose" wanted to deny us
the right to choose the kind of washing machine that sales
data prove we prefer.

The 37,504-word regulation, which was posted in the
Federal Register on October 5, 2000, sets "standards" or
limits on the amount of electricity and water that can be
used by home washing machines, standards that only
front-loading washing machines currently meet.

American consumers overwhelmingly buy the top-loading washers that don't meet these standards. Front-loading washers now available make up less than 12% of
sales. But liberal bureaucrats think they know better
what is good for us.

The Clinton regulation in the Federal Register states
that "consumers will still be able to purchase either a top-loading clothes washer or a front-loading machine,
whichever they prefer." That's a bad joke. The next
paragraph admits, "The Department expects the purchase
price of the high efficiency clothes washers . . . to be
approximately $200 higher than the average price of
clothes washers today."

In other words, you can have your "choice," but
whichever washer you "choose" will cost at least $200
more. The New York Times estimated the increase at
$240 and reported that the cost of a low-end washing
machine will be doubled. When my washing machine
broke down over the Christmas holidays and I was able
to buy a top-loading washer still in stock, the dealer told
me that the front-loader would be twice the price.

But the Clinton regulation tells us not to worry about
the increased cost because we will get it all back through
savings in water and electricity over the next seven years.
Don't believe it. You would have to do eight loads of
laundry a week to realize that saving, and only 15% of
Americans do that much laundry. If you live in an area
where there is plenty of water and electricity, as I do, no
saving will be realized.

Why did Clinton want to control which washing
machines we buy? In finalizing the regulation on his
second-to-last day in office (1-18-01), he stated: "These
new standards for clothes washers, water heaters, residential heat pumps and central air conditioners . . . are a
critical part of our broader effort to address the greatest
environmental challenge of the 21st century: global
warming." (The same regulation imposes new standards
of those other items, too, and will also make them cost
more.)

This washing machine regulation was one of many
ways by which Clinton tried to carry out the goals of the
unratified, unscientific and unjust Global Warming
Treaty, called the Kyoto Protocol. This United Nations
treaty was signed by Al Gore but never ratified by the
U.S. Senate. President Bush wisely announced on March
28, 2001 that he is withdrawing support for it. This "hot
air" treaty would have required us to reduce our energy
use to seven percent below our 1990 levels, while
imposing no limits whatsoever on China, India, Mexico
and other countries.

The washing machine regulations came from the
same mindset of the bureaucrats who in 1992 banned the
sale of toilets that use more than 1.6 gallons of water per
flush. Today there is a flourishing black market in old-style toilets because the new toilets simply can't carry out
the mission assigned to toilets. The 1.6-gallon toilets
don't help the environment, either, because it usually
take two flushes to do the job that the old-style toilets can
accomplish with one flush.

Don't count on industry to protect us against the
government's new regulations. The appliance manufacturers are glad to support the new rule to force us to buy
more expensive washing machines. One manufacturer
said, "selling in the marketplace is easy if there's a
[government] standard in place." A press release from
Whirlpool even "commends" DOE for requiring Americans to buy and use the more expensive energy-efficiency
appliances "because consumers have historically shown
a disinclination to pay more for products that are more
environmentally friendly." The manufacturers have also
been induced to go along because a tax credit for appliance manufacturers who cooperate with these regulations
was built into the plan.

This washing machine mandate is a good example of
the anti-free-market, high-tax regulations devised by the
Clinton-Gore environmentalists who truly believe that
government knows best, even about such things as how
to wash our clothes. Their thinking, which is sill poisoning public policy, is obvious from the publications of
President Clinton's Council on Sustainable Development.
Its 1997 report called "Public Linkage, Dialogue, and
Education" calls for a "purposeful refocusing of the
nation's education system" to teach sustainability as a
catalyst for the "restructuring of educational institutions,
curricula, and teacher training." Students are to be taught
to deal with the "international factors" that affect our
"transition to a sustainable society."

These international factors of "sustainability" are
based on the notion that Americans should feel guilty
because we consume 25% of the earth's resources even
though we are only five percent of the earth's population.
We are expected to be embarrassed because one American uses as much energy as three Japanese, or six Mexicans, or eight American Indians.

To achieve "sustainable development," Americans
are supposed to reduce our "resource consumption."
And, since 35% of our resources is consumed in the
home, households are expected "to make changes in the
way they live." More expensive washing machines,
inefficient toilets, and brownouts in California are some
of the ways that these environmentalists are trying to
reduce the use of energy, especially in our homes.

Americans achieved our high standard of living
through hard work in a free society. Most parents do not
believe that the schools should make children feel guilty
about it and therefore more willing to submit to high
taxes and oppressive regulations.

Most of Bill Clinton's midnight regulations and
Executive Orders should be overturned. We thank
President Bush for rejecting the Global Warming Treaty,
and we thank Congress for overturning the outrageous
ergonomic OSHA rules that took effect four days before
Clinton left office. We thank Rep. Joseph Knollenberg
(R-MI) for his leadership in trying to terminate these
overbearing regulations. We hope the Bush Administration will reassess and rescind the washing machine and
toilet regulations. We need a new dawn of freedom.

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